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Slugcatcher on the OPEC non-event and the surge in LNG demand

OPEC and friends laboured mightily in Vienna last week to produce what was once called a damp squib, a firework that fizzled rather than popped, but while the talk was about oil quotas Slugcatcher saw the real game being played on the sidelines, and it was about gas.

LNG, the stuff which has made Australia a player of global energy significance, barely featured in the wall of words which tumbled out of oil industry leaders as they made minor adjustments to planned oil output.

Officially there is no precise number on a proposed increase in daily oil production, just an agreement to give supply a "measurable" boost, whatever that means.

One interpretation is that OPEC and friends could lift their joint output by up to one million barrels a day, but it might be less if some members fail to overcome cutbacks caused by unplanned stoppages and sanctions such as those starting to affect Iran.